Reducing the Risk of Hot Car Deaths

Good Samaritan laws can offer protection if you help a child in a hot car in an emergency. Call 911 and get the child out of the hot car if you need to.

In the United States, about 37 children die each year in hot cars.

Few are left in the car intentionally.

About half are accidents. Parents who forgot that the child was still in the car.

Many of the deaths are kids who got into the car and couldn’t get out.

All are tragic.

Kids in Hot Cars

How can you forget a child in a car?

Especially a car that might heat up to the point that a child can quickly die inside?

Although many people find it unbelievable that it can happen, it happens just the same.

People, once they are out of their very rigid routine, forget to drop a child off at daycare or that their child is still in the car.

“On days when the ambient temperature was 72°F, we showed that the internal vehicle temperature can reach 117°F within 60 minutes, with 80% of the temperature rise occurring in the first 30 minutes.”

Catherine McLaren on Heat Stress From Enclosed Vehicles

And remember, it doesn’t even have to be that hot outside for a car to quickly heat up.

How Hot Car Deaths Happen

It’s easy to see how some hot car deaths happen.

These are the deaths that are borne out of parental negligence. The kids who are left in a car while their parents party or shop.

But then you have the story of the mom who forgot to drop off her 7-month-old – dad usually drops her off – and doesn’t notice that she is still in the car until she picks up her son at daycare after work.